Thelma (opera)

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (15 August 18751 September 1912) was a British composer and conductor.

Of mixed-race birth, Coleridge-Taylor achieved such success that he was referred to by white New York musicians as the "African Mahler" when he had three tours of the United States in the early 1900s. He was particularly known for his three cantatas on the epic 1855 poem ''The Song of Hiawatha'' by American Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Coleridge-Taylor premiered the first section in 1898, when he was 22.

He married a British woman, Jessie Walmisley, and both their children had musical careers. Their son Hiawatha adapted his father's music for a variety of performances. Their daughter Avril Coleridge-Taylor became a composer-conductor.

Early life and education

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was born at 15 Theobalds Road, Holborn, London, in 1875 to Alice Hare Martin (1856–1953), an English woman, and Daniel Peter Hughes Taylor, a Krio man from Sierra Leone who had studied medicine in the capital and became a prominent administrator in West Africa. They were not married, and Daniel Taylor returned to Africa without learning that Alice was pregnant. (Alice Hare Martin's parents were not married at her birth, either.) Alice Martin named her son Samuel Coleridge Taylor (without a hyphen) after the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Alice lived with her father Benjamin Holmans and his family after she had the boy. Her father was a skilled farrier and was married to a woman other than her mother; they had four daughters and at least one son. Alice and her father called her son Coleridge. The family lived in Croydon, Surrey. In 1887 Alice Martin married George Evans, a railway worker. Their street had a railway line at its end.

Taylor was brought up in Croydon. There were numerous musicians on his mother's side and her father played the violin. He started teaching it to Coleridge when he was young. His ability quickly was obvious, and his grandfather paid for the boy to have violin lessons. The extended family arranged for Taylor to study at the Royal College of Music, beginning at the age of 15. He changed from violin to composition, working under professor Charles Villiers Stanford. After completing his degree, Taylor became a professional musician, soon being appointed a professor at the Crystal Palace School of Music and conducting the orchestra at the Croydon Conservatoire.

The young man later used the name "Samuel Coleridge-Taylor", with a hyphen, said to be following a printer's typographical error. In 1894, his father Daniel Taylor was appointed coroner for the British Empire in the Province of Senegambia.

Marriage

In 1899 Coleridge-Taylor married Jessie Walmisley, whom he had met as a fellow student at the Royal College of Music. Six years older than him, Jessie had left the college in 1893. Her parents objected to the marriage because Taylor was of mixed-race parentage, but relented and attended the wedding. The couple had a son, named Hiawatha (1900–1980) after a Native American immortalised in poetry, and a daughter Gwendolyn Avril (1903–1998). Both had careers in music: Hiawatha adapted his father's works. Gwendolyn started composing music early in life, and also became a conductor-composer; she used the professional name of Avril Coleridge-Taylor.

Career

By 1896, Coleridge-Taylor was already earning a reputation as a composer. He was later helped by Edward Elgar, who recommended him to the Three Choirs Festival. His "Ballade in A minor" was premiered there. His early work was also guided by the influential music editor and critic August Jaeger of music publisher Novello; he told Elgar that Taylor was "a genius".

On the strength of '' Hiawatha's Wedding Feast'', which was conducted by Professor Charles Villiers Stanford at its 1898 premiere and proved to be highly popular, Coleridge-Taylor made three tours of the United States. In the United States, he became increasingly interested in his paternal racial heritage. Coleridge-Taylor participated as the youngest delegate at the 1900 First Pan-African Conference held in London, and met leading Americans through this connection, including poet Paul Laurence Dunbar and scholar and activist W.E.B. Du Bois.

Coleridge-Taylor's father Daniel Taylor was descended from African-American slaves who were freed by the British and evacuated from the colonies at the end of the American War of Independence; some 3,000 of these Black Loyalists were resettled in Nova Scotia. Others were resettled in London and the Caribbean. In 1792 some 1200 blacks from Nova Scotia chose to leave what they considered a hostile climate and society, and moved to Sierra Leone, which the British had established as a colony for free blacks. The Black Loyalists joined free blacks (some of whom were also African Americans) from London, and were joined by maroons from Jamaica, and slaves liberated at sea from illegal slave ships by the British navy. At one stage Coleridge-Taylor seriously considered emigrating to the United States, as he was intrigued by his father's family's past there.

In 1904, on his first tour to the United States, Coleridge-Taylor was received by President Theodore Roosevelt at the White House, a rare event in those days for a man of African descent. His music was widely performed and he had great support among African Americans. Coleridge-Taylor sought to draw from traditional African music and integrate it into the classical tradition, which he considered Johannes Brahms to have done with Hungarian music and Antonín Dvořák with Bohemian music. Having met the African-American poet Paul Laurence Dunbar in London, Taylor set some of his poems to music. A joint recital between Taylor and Dunbar was arranged in London, under the patronage of US Ambassador John Milton Hay. It was organised by Henry Francis Downing, an African-American playwright and London resident. Dunbar and other black people encouraged Coleridge-Taylor to draw from his Sierra Leonean ancestry and the music of the African continent.

Due to his success, Coleridge-Taylor was invited to be one of the judges at music festivals. He was said to be personally shy but was still effective as a conductor.

Composers were not handsomely paid for their music, and they often sold the rights to works outright in order to make immediate income. This caused them to lose the royalties earned by the publishers who had invested in the music distribution through publication. The popular ''Hiawatha's Wedding Feast'' sold hundreds of thousands of copies, but Coleridge-Taylor had sold the music outright for the sum of 15 guineas, so did not benefit directly. He learned to retain his rights and earned royalties for other compositions after achieving wide renown but always struggled financially.

Death

Coleridge-Taylor was 37 when he died of pneumonia. His death is often attributed to the stress of his financial situation. He was buried in Bandon Hill Cemetery, Wallington, Surrey (today in the London Borough of Sutton).

Honours

* The inscription on Coleridge-Taylor's carved headstone includes four bars of music from the composer's best-known work, ''Hiawatha'', and a tribute from his close friend, the poet Alfred Noyes, that includes these words:

* King George V granted Jessie Coleridge-Taylor, the young widow, an annual pension of £100, evidence of the high regard in which the composer was held.
* In 1912 a memorial concert was held at the Royal Albert Hall and garnered over £1400 for the composer's family.
* After Coleridge-Taylor's death in 1912, musicians were concerned that he and his family had received no royalties from his ''Song of Hiawatha'', which was one of the most successful and popular works written in the previous 50 years. (He had sold the rights early in order to get income.) His case contributed to their formation of the Performing Rights Society, an effort to gain revenues for musicians through performance as well as publication and distribution of music.

Coleridge-Taylor's work continued to be popular. He was later championed by conductor Malcolm Sargent. Between 1928 and 1939, Sargent conducted ten seasons of a large costumed ballet version of ''The Song of Hiawatha'' at the Royal Albert Hall, performed by the Royal Choral Society (600 to 800 singers) and 200 dancers.

Legacy

Coleridge-Taylor's greatest success was undoubtedly his cantata '' Hiawatha's Wedding Feast'', which was widely performed by choral groups in England during Coleridge-Taylor's lifetime and in the decades after his death. Its popularity was rivalled only by the choral standards Handel's ''Messiah'' and Mendelssohn's '' Elijah''. The composer soon followed ''Hiawatha's Wedding Feast'' with two other cantatas about Hiawatha, ''The Death of Minnehaha'' and ''Hiawatha's Departure''. All three were published together, along with an Overture, as ''The Song of Hiawatha'', Op. 30. The tremendously popular ''Hiawatha'' seasons at the Royal Albert Hall, which continued until 1939, were conducted by Sargent and involved hundreds of choristers, and scenery covering the organ loft. ''Hiawatha's Wedding Feast'' is still occasionally revived.

Coleridge-Taylor also composed chamber music, anthems, and the ''African Dances'' for violin, among other works. The ''Petite Suite de Concert'' is still regularly played. He set one poem by his namesake Samuel Taylor Coleridge, "The Legend of Kubla Khan".

Coleridge-Taylor was greatly admired by African Americans; in 1901, a 200-voice African-American chorus was founded in Washington, D.C., named the Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Society. He visited the United States three times in the early 1900s, receiving great acclaim, and earned the title "the African Mahler" from the white orchestral musicians in New York in 1910. Public schools were named after him in Louisville, Kentucky, and in Baltimore, Maryland.

Coleridge-Taylor composed a violin concerto for the American violinist Maud Powell. The American performance of the work was subject to rewriting because the parts were lost ''en route''—not, as legend has it, on the RMS ''Titanic'' but on another ship. The concerto has been recorded by Philippe Graffin and the Johannesburg Philharmonic Orchestra under Michael Hankinson (nominated "Editor's Choice" in ''Gramophone'' magazine), Anthony Marwood and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Martyn Brabbins (on Hyperion Records), and Lorraine McAslan and the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Nicholas Braithwaite (on the Lyrita label). It was also performed at Harvard University's Sanders Theatre in the autumn of 1998 by John McLaughlin Williams and William Thomas, as part of the 100th-anniversary celebration of the composition of ''Hiawatha's Wedding Feast''.

Lists of Coleridge-Taylor's compositions and recordings of his work and of the many articles, papers and books about Coleridge-Taylor's life and legacy are available through the Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Foundation and the Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Network.

There are two blue plaques in his memory, one in Dagnall Park, South Norwood, and the other in St Leonards Road, Croydon, at the house where he died. A metal figure in the likeness of Coleridge-Taylor has been installed in Charles Street, Croydon.

A two-hour documentary, ''Samuel Coleridge Taylor and His Music in America, 1900–1912'' (2013), was made about him and includes a performance of several of his pieces, as well as information about him and his prominent place in music. It was written and directed by Charles Kaufmann, and produced by The Longfellow Chorus.

A feature animation, ''The Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Story'' (2013), was made about him, written and directed by Jason Young. It was screened as part of Southwark Black History Month and Croydon Black History Month in 2020.

On 26 August 2021 Coleridge-Taylor's Symphony in A minor received its Proms premier by the Chineke! Orchestra with Kalena Bovell.

Posthumous publishing

In 1999, freelance music editor Patrick Meadows identified three important chamber works by Coleridge-Taylor that had never been printed or made widely available to musicians. A handwritten performing parts edition of the ''Piano Quintet'', from the original in the Royal College of Music (RCM) Library, had been prepared earlier by violinist Martin Anthony Burrage of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. The first modern performance of the ''Piano Quintet'' was given on 7 November 2001 by Burrage's chamber music group, Ensemble Liverpool / Live-A-Music in Liverpool Philharmonic Hall. The lunchtime recital included the ''Fantasiestücke''. Live recordings of this performance are lodged with the RCM and the British Library. The artists were Andrew Berridge (violin), Martin Anthony (Tony) Burrage (violin), Joanna Lacey (viola), Michael Parrott (cello) and John Peace (piano).

After receiving copies of the work from the RCM in London, Patrick Meadows made printed playing editions of the ''Nonet'', ''Piano Quintet'' and ''Piano Trio''. The works were performed in Meadows's regular chamber music festival on the island of Majorca, and were well received by the public as well as the performers. The first modern performances of some of these works were done in the early 1990s by the Boston, Massachusetts-based Coleridge Ensemble, led by William Thomas of Phillips Academy, Andover. This group subsequently made world premiere recordings of the ''Nonet'', ''Fantasiestücke'' for string quartet and ''Six Negro Folksongs'' for piano trio, which were released in 1998 by Afka Records. Thomas, a champion of lost works by black composers, also revived Coleridge's ''Hiawatha's Wedding Feast'' in a performance commemorating the composition's 100th anniversary with the Cambridge Community Chorus at Harvard's Sanders Theatre in the spring of 1998.

The Nash Ensemble's recording of the Piano Quintet was released in 2007.

In 2006, Meadows finished engraving the first edition of Coleridge-Taylor's ''Symphony in A minor''. Meadows has also transcribed from the RCM manuscript the '' Haytian Dances'', a work virtually identical to the ''Noveletten'' but with a fifth movement inserted by Coleridge-Taylor, based on the Scherzo of the symphony. This work is for string orchestra, tambourine and triangle.

''Thelma'', the missing opera

Coleridge-Taylor's only large-scale operatic work, ''Thelma'', was long believed to have been lost. As recently as 1995, Geoffrey Self in his biography of Coleridge-Taylor, ''The Hiawatha Man'', stated that the manuscript of ''Thelma'' had not been located, and that the piece may have been destroyed by its creator. While researching for a PhD on the life and music of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Catherine Carr unearthed the manuscripts of ''Thelma'' in the British Library. She assembled a libretto and catalogued the opera in her thesis, presenting a first critical examination of the work by a thorough investigation of the discovered manuscripts (including copious typeset examples). The work subsequently appeared as such on the catalogue of the British Library.

''Thelma'' is a saga of deceit, magic, retribution and the triumph of love over wickedness. The composer followed Richard Wagner's manner in eschewing the established "numbers" opera format, preferring to blend recitative, aria and ensemble into a seamless whole. It is possible that he had read Marie Corelli's 1887 "Nordic" novel ''Thelma'' (it appears that the name "Thelma" may have been created by Corelli for her heroine). Coleridge-Taylor composed ''Thelma'' between 1907 and 1909; it is alternatively entitled ''The Amulet''.

The full score and vocal score in the British Library are both in the composer's hand – the full score is unbound but complete (save that the vocal parts do not have the words after the first few folios) but the vocal score is bound (in three volumes) and complete with words. Patrick Meadows and Lionel Harrison prepared a type-set full score, vocal score and libretto (the librettist is uncredited and may be Coleridge-Taylor himself). As to the heroine of the title, the composer changed her name to "Freda" in both full and vocal scores (although in the full score he occasionally forgets himself and writes "Thelma" instead of "Freda"). Perhaps Coleridge-Taylor changed the name of his heroine (and might have changed the name of the opera, had it been produced) to avoid creating the assumption that his work was a treatment of Corelli's then very popular novel. Since that precaution is scarcely necessary today, Meadows and Harrison decided to revert to the original ''Thelma''.

There are minor discrepancies between the full score and the vocal score (the occasional passage occurring in different keys in the two, for example), but nothing that would inhibit the production of a complete, staged performance.

''Thelma'' received its world première in Croydon's Ashcroft Theatre in February 2012, the centenary year of the composer's death, performed by Surrey Opera, using an edition prepared by Stephen Anthony Brown. It was conducted by Jonathan Butcher, directed by Christopher Cowell and designed by Bridget Kimak. Joanna Weeks sang the title role, with Alberto Sousa as Eric and Håkan Vramsmo as Carl.

List of compositions

With opus number

* ''Piano Quintet in G minor'', Op. 1 – 1893
* ''Nonet in F minor'' for oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, violin, viola, cello, contrabass and piano, Op. 2 – 1894
* ''Suite for Violin and Organ'' (or piano), Op. 3 (''Suite de Piêces'')- 1893
* ''Ballade in D minor'', Op. 4 – 1895
* ''Five Fantasiestücke'', Op. 5 – 1896
* ''Little Songs for Little Folks'', Op. 6 – 1898
* ''Zara's Earrings'', Op. 7 – 1895
* ''Symphony in A minor'', Op. 8 – 1896
* ''Two Romantic Pieces'', Op. 9 – 1896
* ''Quintet in F sharp minor'' for clarinet and strings, Op. 10 – 1895
* ''Southern Love Songs'', Op. 12 – 1896
* ''String Quartet in D minor'', Op. 13 – 1896 (lost)
* ''Legend'' (''Concertstück''), Op. 14
* ''Land of the Sun'', Op. 15 – 1897
* ''Three Hiawatha Sketches'' for violin and piano, Op. 16 – 1897
* ''African Romances'' (P. L. Dunbar) Op. 17 – 1897
* ''Morning and Evening Service in F'', Op. 18 – 1899
* ''Two Moorish Tone-Pictures'', Op. 19 – 1897
* ''Gypsy Suite'', Op. 20 – 1898
* ''Part Songs'', Op. 21 – 1898
* ''Four Characteristic Waltzes'', Op. 22 – 1899
* ''Valse-Caprice'', Op. 23 – 1898
* ''In Memoriam'', three rhapsodies for low voice and piano, Op. 24 – 1898
* ''Dream Lovers'', Operatic Romance, Op. 25 – 1898
* ''The Gitanos'', cantata-operetta, Op. 26 – 1898
* ''Violin Sonata in D minor'', Op. 28 – ?1898 (pub. 1917)
* ''Three Songs'', Op. 29 – 1898
* ''The Song of Hiawatha'', Op. 30 ("Overture to The Song of Hiawatha", 1899; "Hiawatha's Wedding Feast", 1898; "The Death of Minnehaha", 1899; "Hiawatha's Departure", 1900)
* ''Three Humoresques'', Op. 31 – 1898
* ''Ballade in A minor'', Op. 33 – 1898
* ''African Suite'', Op. 35 – 1899
* ''Six Songs'', Op. 37
* ''Three Silhouettes'', Op. 38 – 1904
* ''Romance in G'', Op. 39 – 1900
* ''Solemn Prelude'', Op. 40 – 1899
* ''Scenes From An Everyday Romance'', Op. 41 – 1900
* ''The Soul's Expression'', four sonnets, Op. 42 – 1900
* ''The Blind Girl of Castél-Cuillé'', Op. 43
* ''Idyll'', Op. 44 – 1901
* ''Six American Lyrics'', Op. 45 – 1903
* ''Concert Overture'', ''Toussaint L'Ouverture'', Op. 46 – 1901
* ''Hemo Dance'', scherzo, Op. 47(1) – 1902
* ''Herod'', incidental music, Op. 47(2) – 1901
* ''Meg Blane'', Rhapsody of the Sea, Op. 48 – 1902
* ''Ullyses'', incidental music, Op. 49 – 1902
* ''Three Song Poems'', Op. 50 – 1904
* ''Four Novelletten'', Op. 51(1?) – 1903
* ''Ethiopia Saluting the Colours'', march, Op. 51(2?) – 1902
* ''The Atonement'', sacred cantata, Op. 53 – 1903
* ''Five Choral Ballads'', Op. 54 – 1904
* ''Moorish Dance'', Op. 55 – 1904
* ''Three Cameos for Piano'', Op. 56 – 1904
* ''Six Sorrow Songs'', Op. 57 – 1904
* ''Four African Dances'', Op. 58 – 1904
* ''Twenty-Four Negro Melodies'', Op. 59(1) – 1905
* ''Romance'', Op. 59(2) – 1904
* ''Kubla Khan'', rhapsody, Op. 61 – 1905
* ''Nero'', incidental music, Op. 62 – 1906
* ''Symphonic Variations on an African Air'', Op. 63 – 1906
* ''Scenes de Ballet'', Op. 64 – 1906
* ''Endymion's Dream'', one-act opera, Op. 65 – 1910
* ''Forest Scenes'', Op. 66 – 1907
* ''Part Songs'', Op. 67 – 1905
* ''Bon-Bon Suite'', Op. 68 – 1908
* ''Sea Drift'', Op. 69 – 1908
* ''Faust'', incidental music, Op. 70 – 1908
* ''Valse Suite'': "Three fours", Op. 71- 1909
* ''Thelma'', opera in three acts, Op. 72 – 1907-09
* ''Ballade in C minor'', Op. 73 – 1909
* ''Forest of Wild Thyme'', incidental music, Op. 74 (five numbers) – 1911–25
* ''Rhapsodic Dance'', ''The Bamboula'', Op. 75 – 1911
* ''A Tale of Old Japan'', Op. 76 – 1911
* ''Petite Suite de Concert'', Op. 77 – 1911
* ''Three Impromptus'', Op. 78 – 1911
* ''Othello'', incidental music, Op. 79 – 1911
* ''Violin Concerto in G minor'', Op. 80 – 1912
* ''Two Songs for Baritone Voice'', Op. 81 – 1913
* ''Hiawatha'' Ballet in five scenes, Op. 82 – 1920Coleridge-Taylor, Avril, ''The Heritage of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor'', London: Dobson, 1979, pp. 145–154.

Without opus number

* Trio in E minor (1893)
* ''The Lee Shore''
* ''Eulalie''
* ''Variations for Cello and Piano''

Recordings

* ''Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Special Limited First Recording'', November 2001, Liverpool Philharmonic Hall: inc. first performance in more than a century of the ''Quintet for Piano & Strings in G min. Op. 1'' ealised for performance from the original score by Martin Anthony Burrage, and performed by him and RLPO colleagues plus ''Fantasiestucke for String Quartet Op.5''
* ''Ballade in A minor, op. 33'', ''Symphonic Variations on an African Air, op. 63'' - Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Grant Llewellyn, Argo Records 436 401-2
* ''Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Chamber Music'' – Hawthorne String Quartet. Label: Koch International 3-7056-2
*
Heart & Hereafter - Collected Songs
', Elizabeth Llewellyn (soprano), Simon Lepper (piano). Label: Orchid Classics ORC100164 (2021)
* ''Hiawatha'' – Welsh National Opera, – conductor Kenneth Alwyn, soloist Bryn Terfel. Label: Decca 458 591–2
* ''Piano & Clarinet Quintets'' – Nash Ensemble. Label: Hyperion CDA67590
* ''Violin Sonata; African Dances; Hiawathan Sketches; Petite Suite de Concert'' – David Juritz (violin), Michael Dussek (piano). Label: Epoch CDLX 7127
* ''Sir Malcolm Sargent conducts British Music'' includes "Othello Suite" – New Symphony Orchestra. Label: Beulah 1PD13
* ''The Romantic Violin Concerto Volume 5'' includes "Violin Concerto in G minor, Op. 80" – Anthony Marwood (violin), BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Martyn Brabbins (conductor). Label: Hyperion CDA67420
* ''Symphony, Op. 8'', Aarhus Symphony Orchestra, Douglas Bostock (conductor), in The British Symphonic Collection, Vol. 15. Classico label by Olufsen Records
* 2nd of the ''Three Impromptus, Op. 78'' for organ, on ''Now Let Us Sing!'', 2013 recording by the Choir of Worcester Cathedral, played by Christopher Allsop.

References

Sources and further reading

*
* Bobby & Co., London (n.d)
* , personal printing
*
*
*
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*

External links

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Foundation

Songs by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor
at The Art Song Project


AfriClassical.com

"Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875–1912)"
''Composer of the Week'', BBC Radio 3
* "Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875–1912)" at BBC Music

"Who Was Samuel Coleridge-Taylor? (He's Not to Be Confused with Samuel Taylor Coleridge)"
''Londonist'', 19 May 2017.
*
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor and His Music in America, 1900–1912
' The full Longfellow Chorus documentary on YouTube
* Samuel Coleridge Taylor
''Melody''
(1898). Andrew Pink (2021
Exordia ad missam

Scores

The Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Collection
at the Irving S. Gilmore Music Library, Yale University

Four characteristic waltzes. Op. 22
at the Sibley Music Library Digital Scores Collection

"Five and twenty sailormen"
at the Sibley Music Library Digital Scores Collection

Concerto in G minor for violin & orchestra, op. 80
at the Sibley Music Library Digital Scores Collection

Organ music, Selections
at the Sibley Music Library Digital Scores Collection

Sonata in D minor for violin and piano, op. 28
at the Sibley Music Library Digital Scores Collection

Variations in B minor for violoncello & piano
at the Sibley Music Library Digital Scores Collection

Liner Notes for the Hyperion recording of the Violin Concerto Op. 80
*
*

{{DEFAULTSORT:Coleridge-Taylor, Samuel
1875 births
1912 deaths
19th-century British composers
19th-century British male musicians
19th-century classical composers
19th-century English musicians
20th-century British male musicians
20th-century classical composers
20th-century English composers
Alumni of the Royal College of Music
Black British classical musicians
Black classical composers
Deaths from pneumonia in England
English classical composers
English male classical composers
English opera composers
English people of African-American descent
English people of Sierra Leonean descent
English Romantic composers
Light music composers
Male opera composers
Musicians from London
Oratorio composers
People from Croydon
People from Holborn
Pupils of Charles Villiers Stanford
Sierra Leone Creole people